Openhole Mechanical Packer with Eccentric Shunt-Tube Gravel Pack Assembly Reduces Capex and Accelerates Production in Kaombo Deepwater Development, Angola

Hernandez, J.C.; Lai, Baochun; Bahabanian, Olivier; Goyallon, D.; Nordin, Amirul; Nwafor, Chidi; Taleballah, E. Y.; Semin, Leonid

doi:10.2118/189491-ms

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 4 publications

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“…A whole range of different approaches to the problem are proposed and applied in oil and gas reservoirs. Several industries have proposed the use of mechanical treatments such as the use of packers and inflow control devices, which selectively pass the oil or gas over other fluids. , Nevertheless, chemical treatments have been shown to cope with the problem more efficiently . In situ crosslinkable polymers have been widely used for water shut-off where the formulation is designed to be injected as a liquid and the gelation is to be complete in the designated area, leading to plugging the water-producing zone .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of pH-Controlled Aluminum-Based Polymeric Gel for Conformance Control in Sour Gas Reservoirs

et al. 2020

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Excessive water production from natural gas reservoirs is a main challenge facing the industry nowadays. Polymeric gelants have been widely applied to seal the water production zones, leading to a more feasible production operation. Nevertheless, conventional treatments fail in reservoirs characterized with the presence of sour gases. In this paper, aluminum-based salts are investigated as potential replacement for the conventional chromium acetate as crosslinkers for polyacrylamide (PAM), where aluminum has the advantage of being more environment-friendly besides its abundance. The investigation covers the whole pH range and examines the rheological behavior of the mature gels in the temperature range between 25 and 100 °C. While chromium acetate was proven to be sensitive to the presence of sour gases, namely, CO 2 and H 2 S, because of the inability to produce a stable gel at the acidic conditions, this paper presents aluminum-based crosslinkers that are more tolerable toward high acidity. Unlike the conventional crosslinkers, the gelation rate in aluminum acetate and aluminum aminoacetate systems was found to decrease with the increase in pH. Both the crosslinkers succeeded in producing a strong gel with a storage modulus of more than 2000 Pa. Moreover, this study relates the physical stability of the colloidal aluminum crosslinkers with the viscoelastic behavior of the mature gel. The results reveal that aluminum acetate, among the screened salts, has a controllable gelation time at pH conditions between 3.5 and 8.5 and is the most stable in the temperature range 25–100 °C. PAM/ AlAc system has a gelation time of around 50 min at 75 °C making it suitable for near-wellbore treatments, while the gelation time increased to 80 min upon increasing the pH of the system from 4.1 to 4.6. Moreover, the system showed good stability in saline conditions with NaCl concentration of up to 50,000 ppm. Scanning electron microscopy of freeze-dried samples proved the uniform distribution of colloidal crosslinkers and showed sheets wrapping around the colloidal particles. The performance of the new crosslinker is compared with available commercial crosslinkers.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of pH-Controlled Aluminum-Based Polymeric Gel for Conformance Control in Sour Gas Reservoirs

et al. 2020

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Evolution of Open-Hole Gravel Pack Methodology in a Low Frac-Window Environment: Case Histories and Lessons Learned From the Kraken Field Development

Alexander

Bruce

Williamson

et al. 2019

Day 1 Mon, September 30, 2019

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The Kraken field development was planned and executed through several batch drilling and completion phases to allow a review of each phase and incorporate the lessons learned in the next phase. All producers were drilled with an oil-based reservoir drilling fluid (OB-RDF). The lower completion with shunted sand control screens was installed in conditioned OB-RDF, followed by displacements to water-based fluids after the packer was set. Gravel packing was performed with a visco-elastic surfactant fluid, and a breaker treatment was spotted across the open hole prior to isolating the open hole with a fluid loss control valve. This paper discusses the design, execution and evaluation of the lower completion phase for the development of the Kraken field in the North Sea. This includes detailed reservoir evaluation, methodology followed for sandface completion selection, steps taken to improve efficiency through lessons learned and continuously extend well lengths to be gravel packed in a low frac-window environment, and well performance results in this 24-well field development, with focus on the 7 out of 13 oil producers, detailing 3 of them.

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Development and Qualification of Enhanced Shunted Screens for Openhole Gravel Packing of Long Intervals

Kumar

Gadiyar

Langlais

et al. 2020

Day 4 Thu, October 29, 2020

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For offshore wells requiring sand control, the trend in the industry has been to gravel pack longer and longer wells to access more reserves with reduced well count. In challenging environments (e.g., low frac pressure), gravel packing with shunt tube technique is the preferred option. This paper discusses development and qualification of an enhanced shunted alternate path technology (ESAPT) screen that will extend openhole gravel packing lengths to more than 7,000 ft with zonal isolation. Extending openhole gravel pack lengths with shunt tubes required several issues to be addressed. First, if static shunting (bypassing an annular blockage through shunts and packing in a toe-to-heel fashion downstream of the blockage) occurs intentionally or unintentionally, large volumes of slurry will exit through a limited number of shunt tubes manifolds before complete packing, raising erosion concerns which were addressed through: 1) computational fluid dynamics simulations to identify the location of maximum erosion and to redesign the shunts geometry and metallurgy accordingly; 2) yard tests with slurries passing through the manifold at rates representative of field applications. Second, if continuous shunting (bypassing an annular blockage through shunts and packing in a heel-to-toe fashion downstream of the blockage) occurs, the pressure inside the shunt tubes can: 1) exceed the burst pressure limit of conventional shunted alternate path technology (CSAPT) screens, which was addressed through modification of the weak links in the CSAPT and then tested to the required burst limit; 2) cause higher fluid leak-off through the packed interval, resulting in increased gravel concentration, increased friction and potential bridging inside the shunt tubes, which was addressed through a) leak-off behavior characterization of carrier fluids in shunt tubes of packed interval; b) friction pressure measurements with various gravel concentrations and rates inside shunt; c) modification of nozzle distance based on results from (a) and (b), and d) verification of the modified design through gravel pack yard testing. Recent testing demonstrated that under static shunting conditions, CSAPT shunt system can have substantial erosion in long interval gravel packing. ESAPT shunt system showed significantly improved erosion resistance for slurry flow in yard tests. It was demonstrated that ESAPT shunt system could withstand 10,000 psi burst pressure after flowing 450 klbs of proppant at 5 bpm slurry rate. It was also successfully tested for 10,000 psi burst pressure at elevated downhole temperature of 300F. The data from leak-off tests of viscous fluids through packed interval shunt tubes at high differential pressures combined with friction pressure measurements with various gravel concentrations and rates (gravel concentrations as high as 20 ppa and rates as low as 0.25 bpm) led to the conclusion that the distance from the shunt manifold to the first nozzle needed to be increased for longer wells to be gravel packed. In a yard test using a full-scale model of the new design with the increased nozzle distance, and including the blank handling sections, a complete pack was achieved with proppant. An ESAPT screen that will push the openhole gravel pack lengths to more than 7,000 ft with zonal isolation is presented herein. The system has a more erosion-resistant, high burst pressure shunt system and allows quicker make-up of screen joints on the rig floor.

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Openhole Mechanical Packer with Eccentric Shunt-Tube Gravel Pack Assembly Reduces Capex and Accelerates Production in Kaombo Deepwater Development, Angola

Cited by 7 publications

References 4 publications

Development of pH-Controlled Aluminum-Based Polymeric Gel for Conformance Control in Sour Gas Reservoirs

Development of pH-Controlled Aluminum-Based Polymeric Gel for Conformance Control in Sour Gas Reservoirs

Evolution of Open-Hole Gravel Pack Methodology in a Low Frac-Window Environment: Case Histories and Lessons Learned From the Kraken Field Development

Development and Qualification of Enhanced Shunted Screens for Openhole Gravel Packing of Long Intervals

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